


A Question Of Trust

by lindsey_grissom



Series: Crystal Heart [12]
Category: Doctor Who (2005), Torchwood
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-17
Updated: 2010-01-17
Packaged: 2017-10-10 15:36:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,128
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/101342
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lindsey_grissom/pseuds/lindsey_grissom
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Late at night on the TARDIS, Jack thinks about these people that trust him, when he doesn't even trust himself.</i>  Part of the <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/series/3978">Crystal Heart</a> 'Verse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Question Of Trust

He doesn't understand them; these travellers. Doesn't understand why they keep him around when they have passed so many good places to leave him.

He won't admit it, but he likes where he is. And not just physically. If you can be physically anywhere in a TARDIS. But mentally, he is far more stable than he has been for a long time.

The gap is still there, the empty darkness in his mind continues to haunt him, and he still worries that more of his memories will be eaten away, but the life of a con-man is not for him.

And maybe that life was taking more from him than any memory removal ever could.

An awful con-man, they call him, because when it came down to it, he cared more about saving lives than making money. Apparently he can't even get that right.

And they trust him. That scares him more than any alien ever will. So they don't know everything about him, barely anything really, but they know he was a Time Agent, a con-man and that sometime over two years he did something so terrible his memory had to be violated.

And they trust him.

He doesn't even trust himself.

He does not want their trust, even if the feeling fills him with something he has not felt for years. But he cannot bring himself to make them stop.

He should betray them, something definite and final, but he can't. They have wormed their way into his heart, the Time Lord and his oh so human companion and he knows that the only way he will leave is if they tell him to.

He loves them, he realises and the thought does not concern him as much as it should.

He loves them both, would sleep with them if he could, but doesn't obsess about it. He is quite happy to live on the outskirts of their lives; surviving on the scraps of belonging they send his way. He knows how pathetic that makes him, but he can be pathetic if that is what it takes for them to keep him here.

No one else can know, of course, especially not the Doctor and Rose, but rarely does the outside reflect the inner him, so it should not be too hard to hide it.

After all, they haven't seen him flinch when they call the TARDIS 'home', or noticed how he leaves them alone when Rose talks about her family.

No, they will not find out about what he is, the unwanted orphan child he was, or the pathetic needy man he has become. He has an infamous persona already, and they expect that from him.

It really is not hard to become now, the Galactic Playboy image like a coat he just shrugs into. It is almost like a second skin, but sometimes, sometimes he can feel it pulling just a little too tight.

The doors of the TARDIS stand wide open and he looks on absently as the Time Vortex swirls passed him.

Part of him wants to take the TARDIS to so many places. There are so many times in his life where one or two things he wishes he could change.

As a Time Agent his movements were carefully followed and restricted. But the Doctor works for himself, reports to no one and the temptation is sometimes too great.

He could travel back, or is it forward, to when the Time Agency stole his memories. He could find out where they stored them, or maybe someone would be able to fill him in, so long as he got the timing right.

Or James.

Even after so many years, his friend still haunts his moments awake or asleep.

He could stop himself from leading them both to war. Or even further back, he could insist that the child James stay away from him, far away. It would not be hard, he knows how everyone warned the other children away, so it would not even appear strange for him to do the same.

He won't though. And he curses the Doctor and Rose for that.

He was never careless with lives, but he had shut away his conscience so many years ago. But the Doctor, the man had tugged it back out, and now he cannot even seriously contemplate releasing hordes of Reapers on his world.

He can see them from where he sits, his legs dangling limply over the lip of the doorway. Their massive wings catching the red light of Time, ears and eyes open to the slightest paradox. He knows they do not always find all the discrepancies, he has seen enough of the Doctor's work to know that changes to history can sometimes go unnoticed. He supposes that some things just are not far reaching enough for the Reapers. They are only interested in causing extreme destruction.

Light steps approach him from behind and he tenses instinctively. The Doctor does not appreciate him touching _his_ TARDIS, but the night is too long today and the literal passing of Time comforts him.

He turns in surprise as the Doctor settles beside him, it is a different move; usually the Doctor simply tells him to return to his room.

"Every night, Captain, I find you here and I send you away. Wilful disobedience will not get you more than a one-way trip out these doors." The northern accent is comforting too, even when the tone is not pleasant. He refuses to think about the implications of that; he has spent enough time contemplating how pathetic he is.

He says nothing; maybe this is it, the moment when the last few weeks will draw to an end, one more file in the holobook of his life. If it is, then he will not make this easier; he needs to hear the Doctor push him away, needs to have the door shut firmly behind him, because otherwise, otherwise he will just keep coming back.

A small lump of something is dropped onto his lap and shocked from his thoughts he glances down at it. A key. His brows furrow in confusion, perhaps this is some Timelord leaving tradition he is not familiar with. Silently, he is still reluctant to speak, he looks up as the Doctor rises to his feet.

"'Seem to like opening these doors s'much, though' you'd like t'do it from both sides."

He watches the older man disappear from the console room, the key heavy in his hands. It will not be enough, anymore, just having these doors shut in his face. They will have to take his key too, before he can ever think of leaving them.

Pathetic. But closer to family than he has ever gotten before.

 

**End.**


End file.
